OK, I admit it. That is the title I really WANTED to use two weeks ago, but I thought better of it, because I figured it would be in poor taste. And that certain people might notice. And kick me out of the family. (I'll bet a lot of writers get kicked out of their family. It must be a big job hazard.)

But now things are much better. He knows who everybody is. No more ICU, and not even a real hospital. My father-in-law is in a rehabilitation hospital instead of a regular one. What's the difference?

Well, the rehab place has a lot of stuff going on all day that they call Therapy. One is a beanbag game. Apparently you can get paid to play bags, as long as you do it indoors, one-on-one, with someone who has been injured or has had surgery.

Please, please, no one tell my oldest! If he ever finds out that, merely by switching careers, he can get paid to play bags he will quit his job faster than you can say, "Throw me a cold one."

They also have bad food. At the regular hospital the food was pretty good, and they had a Room Service Menu in every room. Of course, all the good stuff was off-limits for our patient, because he was on Mechanical Soft Diet. That is hospital-talk for Cut-it-all-up-really-small-so-someone-wearing-a-neckbrace-doesn't-choke-Diet. And jello.

The rehab hospital has bad food. I figure that's to motivate you to go home. Because the rest of the stay is pretty cushy. The bed is motorized to confrom to your body movements so that when he shifts postions, the bed responds by inflating and deflating. Don't worry. It's not as kinky as it sounds.

My spouse was extra nice on Easter Sunday, and she made an entire Mechanical Soft Easter Dinner. For our whole family. Then we transported it over to the facility and took over a couple of tables in their cafeteria, which was closed for the afternoon. We had mechanical soft beef pot roast with mechanical soft potatoes and carrots and onions. And mechanical soft carrot cake. Also warm rolls from the oven. It was a pretty good Easter dinner.

Considering.

Now he is a little more mobile. He is learning how to get out of his bed by himself. He is relying on a walker, but getting faster by the day. Today he got to leave the facility for a doctor appointment with the surgeon who did his neck surgery two weeks ago. And they took him for a strawberry milkshake from Steak 'n Shake. Those are good milkshakes.

And they're mechanically soft.

This was so long ago that archaeologists have been calling. They like to be able to research the habits of past cultures. Back when I was single people didn't use on-line dating services. They didn't use on-line anything. In fact, lines themselves had only recently been invented, and they were mostly being used for phones. As in, "This line is out of service." Yes, back then phones were physically attached to the walls. And you didn't have to recharge them. And gasoline. All the lines that weren't used for phones were used by gas stations. People had to wait in them. Because gas was in short supply, and hence very expensive. It was pushing a dollar a gallon.

But I digress. What I really wanted to point out is that there is an ad for an on-line dating service that appears at the top of my space. I assume that it helps pay the bills for MSN. When I see the ads I feel very sad. Very sad for these women.

They can't find dates.

There are three of them, and I can only guess what they must smell like. Or sound like. They must have a bad problem in one of those areas. Because otherwise I would think they could get dates the normal way. Which would be to walk outside their house and have guys physically chase after them.

The first young lady, Nikki, is a 26 year old Female with Green Eyes. She is a Teacher, but she looks like someone from The Hills. Then there's Jess, a 27-year old Female with Green Eyes who is a Nurse, but looks like a young Darryl Hannah. And last there is Nella. She is a 28 year old Female with Green Eyes. She is a Dancer, and she looks like Paris Hilton, but without the attitude.

It seems weird that they all have Green Eyes. Also weird that anyone would care. ("Yeah, I liked the last girl I went out with, but, man, I can't call her again." "Really? She seemed nice." "Yeah, she was nice. But her eyes are a weird color." "Yeah, I know what you mean.")

I feel sorry for them. Back when I was single they would have had no problem getting dates. In fact, girls like them sometimes had to take their phones off the hook. (Phones used to have hooks. And you could hang them up. But I digress.)

Apparently it's a lot more challenging these days for young women to get dates. So they have to pay actual money and hope that someone sees them on-line. At the top of my page. And calls them up. I am going to tell the archaeologist to give them a call. He's a nice guy. Male. With Green Eyes.

Having only boys, I sometimes get to spout off on several random subjects without ever worrying that one day I may have to eat my words: Weddings.

That's several random subjects, isn't it?

I was just reading a great piece on-line about how the "wedding-industrial complex" manipulates brides into thinking that they have to have all these essential elements in their wedding plans, when really the items were marketing devices originally created specifically to ramp up the profit from the typical wedding.

http://finance.yahoo.com/expert/article/moneyhappy/39681

Last summer I came across a new acquaintance who was wearing a red stone on the ring finger of her left hand. Hmmm, I wondered, looks like an engagement ring. But not a diamond. That's creative, I thought. So, I asked her if it is her engagement ring.

"No. It's a promise ring."

"What's a promise ring? Does that mean that he promised to marry you?"

"No, that would be the engagement ring. The promise ring means that he promised me that he would ask me."

"Oh." I decided it's a lot like the politician who makes an announcement that sometime later this year he plans to announce his candidacy. He's not announcing that he IS a candidate, he's only announcing that he's going to announce it.

 "I've been wearing this for eight years though. Ever since high school."

"He still hasn't asked you?"

"We've talked about it. But he can't afford a ring yet."

Wow! I thought. But then I am just reading that engagement rings themselves were only thought of in the 1920s as a marketing ploy by DeBeers, the international diamond dealer. According to the same article, the "average" wedding now costs $28,000. What is that an average of, you might wonder? Well it's an average of brides' responses who sent in answers to a bridal industry magazine. That might skew the results a bit, don't you think? If I wanted to know how much a typical guy spends to customize his vehicle, but I only surveyed guys who read car magazines about tricking their rides, I might leave out a few million ordinary guys who hardly spend anything and just drive what they buy. Rehearsal dinners. Bachlorette parties. Gift bags. Save-the-date cards. Somebody thought 'em all up.

Knowing that merely mentioning the fact that traffic seems to be flowing smoothly will cause someone on the road ahead to have either an accident or roadside breakdown means that you have to really watch what you say.

Actually, you have to watch what you THINK, because if you watch what you say, well, you already said it. Then it's too late. And you find yourself inching past a forsaken vehicle on the side of the road hoping no one was hurt. All because you FORGOT YOU'RE A JINX and glanced over at your beautiful spouse, and said something like, "Hey, we're making pretty good time."

Which brings me to the subject of Barack. I'm sure everyone already knows why Hillary's campaign is resurgent and John McCain is seen standing on the White House grounds next to George W. Bush: I wrote about Barack two weeks ago and all hell broke loose.

Now, as long as I was merely hopeful, everything was going good. But as soon as I became . . . (I am hesitating to use the word) . . . confident . . . well, then people all over the states of Ohio and Texas got up in the morning, wiped the sleep from their eyes, and said to themselves, "Barack! Barack Obama?? What have I been thinking?" Then they started reading through their large mounds of Hillary and McCain campaign material while thinking, . . . well, I don't really know what they're thinking, but it might be, "Wouldn't it be interesting to wait until the end of August to pick a Democratic nominee so that precious campaign weeks will be lost and the Republicans will have a reasonable chance to win a lot of states so that all that stuff that Gord wrote about back in February will look like COMPLETE nonsense?"